New YAMAHA CDRW Drive

[DentyCracker]

YAMAHA CRW-F1ZE 44X/24X/44X EIDE INTERNAL CDRW W/SW looks interesting for $171.00

YAMAHA CRW-F1ZS 44X/24X/44X SCSI INTERNAL CDRW W/SW for $235 if you're into SCSI

I suspect these are faster than the 48X drives out there.
Anyone know for sure?

[Gurm]

Just say noooooooooo.

Yamaha's drives are notoriously bad. Their 24x drive wasn't really 24x, and most of their drives up to that point wouldn't read RAW.

Add to that the fact that I've had a few Yamaha drives go up in smoke, and I can't recommend them.

Liteon, or Plextor.

- Gurm

[SteveC]

I've got a 20/10/40 Yamaha and it's the nuts! I recommend them wholeheartedly. Gurm - you're wrong about the 24x are not 24x or whatever - they are, it's just they are using <B>Partial CAV</B>. This makes the resultant CD more reliable - there are no breaks (or 'links') made whilst writing, and better still, the CD (on the 20x for example) never goes over 5500rpm, whereas other 'burnproof/justlink' drives write with the disc going at 8-9000 rpm!

See http://www.yamaha-it.de/england/prod...eBurn.htm#pcav

[Gurm]

Steve,

Glad you like your drive. The consensus at CD freaks and other places, though, is that Yamaha lags behind Plextor notoriously.

- Gurm

[Technoid]

I newer forgot the review in a swedish PC magazine where a Yamaha got the highest score despite the fact that it made the most errors in copying....

[Gurm]

Yep. That sounds like Yamaha.

- Gurm

[The PIT]

Well the one I've got seems a bit twitchy and will after a few months disappear of the scsi bus. Unplugging it and plugging it back in seems to cure the problem. it isn't the cable unless it's got several faulty connectors on it.

[xortam]

First of all I'd like to say that's its nice to see a new SCSI burner released. I guess the competition got too thin and somebody had to come back in to fill the demand. Secondly, the only piece of PC equipment that ever failed on my was my Yammy SCSI burner. I had the 4416S that wouldn't format a RW anymore. I tried cleaning the lens but I could never clear an error from it after that. It might have been a reassembly error but I never could get it working so I bought a Plextor. The Plextor has seen 100 times the workout of the Yammy but its never complained once.

[Ribbit]

Got a 4416S here as well, never given a problem although it's had very little use.

It is nice to see a new SCSI burner turn up, though I'd like to see Plextor get back into this. Have they actually given up on making SCSI hardware? All their recent hardware has been EIDE or USB. Pity, since SCSI is where they made their name.

[thop]

the yamaha with the blue led looks stylish. still i got myself a shiny plextor.

[az]

FYI, Disc T@2 (Disc Tattoo) is pretty useless. It uses the outer part of the CD, and there can be no data where the "Tattoo" is - a small 10pt text round the disc (like the copyright notice), which is barely readable, sucks up 100 MB. Plus, the picture is not very visible on "bright" CDs (but there are not many dark blue CDs made anymore).

And the "tattooing" only works at 8x or so.

It's still a nice funny feature

AZ

[William]

The F1 is new, & as such unproven. It has nice features, and if you want T@2, or AAQM then it's the only game in town.

It will be faster than some 48x drives, but slower than others, (Z-CLV vs. CAV). Yamaha around the time of the 4416 were crap -bad design. The 8x ones were late to market, so didn't get bought much; & therefore didn't get subjected to the same sort of testing. The 2100 was the start of the newer models, however it was hated for using P-CAV rather than CLV, so again not exposed to huge sections of the market. When Yamaha released the 2200, it looked OK against other 20x drives, but slower than the crop of 24x ones. With the 3200, Yamaha had a good drive, which hit the sweet spot of the market. It's proved itself very reliable.

As for their SCSI adaptors; beware the Yamaha chip that they used to use on it has gone EOL (or rather, it disapeared when Epson renumbered. Enquiries to Epson indicate that it's not available for purchase, so it looks like it died). I don't kow what they are planning on using on the new ones, but a Yamaha employee has said he will tell me as soon as he finds out.

As for Plextor, they are largely living on reputation now, rather than actual quality. The last SCSI drive they made was the 1210S, which was designed a year or two back. Since then, their drives have gone downhill. Plextor have (was still working for them 4 months back, haven't checked since) at least one known highly experienced guy in tech support. Yamaha have one known quantity who does at least some tech support, and who seems actively interested in hearing oppinions. If I wanted to buy a CD burner tommorrow, I'd buy the Yamaha F1 without a second thought, but that's just me.

[xortam]

The Plextor that I replaced the Yammy 4416S for was indeed their last SCSI drive, the PX-W1210S. I've been very happy with this drive so I'm not in the market for a replacement. I'm glad to hear that Yamaha has pumped up its SCSI line with a new fast drive and I hope it proves to be a winner. Options are a good thing.

[The PIT]

It's nice too see a scsi drive appear. Perhaps the format isn't dead.

[KvHagedorn]

Originally posted by xortam
The Plextor that I replaced the Yammy 4416S for was indeed their last SCSI drive, the PX-W1210S. I've been very happy with this drive so I'm not in the market for a replacement. I'm glad to hear that Yamaha has pumped up its SCSI line with a new fast drive and I hope it proves to be a winner. Options are a good thing.

Heh.. xortam, this was my story exactly. My Yamaha 4416s died and I replaced it with a PW-W1210S. Amazing.

Let's buy Plextor and make some more SCSI drives, including a DVD!